


gentle on my mind

by kingcowb0y



Category: Borderlands (Video Games)
Genre: Background Relationships, M/M, Multi, Nonbinary Lorelei (Borderlands), Nonbinary Zer0 (Borderlands), Other, Teen for language, afaik bl3 doesn't say where axton went, i think, so have a sad little fic about that, warning for mentioned building collapse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-31
Updated: 2020-07-31
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:08:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25622635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kingcowb0y/pseuds/kingcowb0y
Summary: zer0 reflects on days gone by.
Relationships: Axton/Zer0 (Borderlands), Lorelei/Rhys/Zer0 (Borderlands)
Kudos: 4





	gentle on my mind

**Author's Note:**

> title from "gentle on my mind" by glen campbell. i think it fits

zer0 is lost in thought, in memory. memory of a dream.

once, a long time ago, they had thought they had it all. stupid to think so, given their line of work, but they still thought it. them and axton. it was a dream, of course; a beautiful dream.

compared to then, now isn’t so pretty. now is also nicer, in a way, but still much less pretty. now has a solid weight behind it that the old dream never quite did. 

zer0 is supposed to be sitting watch, in the middle of the night, looking out for maliwan forces. the newest vault hunters are running around the streets of meridian haphazardly, something about some mission or another. they remember that part of vault hunting, always scrounging for dollars from whoever needed errands run. it would be okay for now. atlas couldn’t move against maliwan just yet anyways. speaking of, none are in sight right now, so zer0 goes back to thinking. remembering.

axton was... beautiful. cocky, a bastard, sure. but beautiful.  _ beautifully stupid too _ , they think fondly. he’s been missing for years at this point, but zer0 holds out some hope that he’ll walk back in one day. 

not that they don’t like what they have, mind. rhys and lorelei are wonderful. zer0 is beyond lucky to have not one but two beautiful souls around them who love them, but sometimes, the way the stars in the night sky twinkle down at zer0 just bring that dream back to them, and sometimes, they indulge.

it was right after they’d stumbled back to sanctuary, half dead, the six of them and lilith and mordecai and brick, that zer0 had first dared say anything. something about how beautiful the sunrise was.

_ what sunrise, bud? it’s still dark out _ , axton laughed.

_ the eternal dawn / rises and rises from you. / it is beautiful. _

_ aw, shucks, _ he said, going a little red. zer0 pretended not to notice, worked not to stare.  _ uh, it’s kinda late, bud. i, uh, i think i’m gonna get some of those med hypos so i don’t feel so half dead even if i’ll still look it and then head off to bed, yeah?  _

he hadn’t looked half dead to zer0’s eyes. truth be told, zer0 was--is--still amazed that they’d even  _ lived _ through that whole ordeal. killing jack... wasn’t easy, to say the least. and that warrior thing... well, it still brings up harsh memories. zer0 hadn’t been as good as they are now, not then. but axton and his sentry’s shield had been the only thing keeping them, all of them, alive in that fight.

zer0 had been left sitting alone on the edge of sanctuary, then. they thought about krieg, sitting in dr. zed’s medbay. and gaige, such a young thing, still shook up, but in the bunks in hq with everyone else. some things had been built under the city and had survived scooter’s little trick to get sanctuary off ground. it was amazing, really, that the city still even moved. everyone else had come out of that fight drained or severely wounded. axton looked scratchless; zer0 wondered when it would hit him. 

time had sort of slid by slowly after that. axton started hanging around zer0 more. zer0, stupidly, liked it. the two of them were familiar, of course; everyone was, to an extent. they had a set up. they worked well together, made a good team. but there hadn’t been... partnerships. not like this. maybe zer0 could have had that. and they did, for a bit. a year or so after jack was dead.

they had gone on dates between fights at mr. torgue’s arena. gotten sand all in their clothes out on irresponsible late night sandskiff drives in oasis. sat together to watch the sunset in sanctuary, and drank the night til they were laughing and crying in miss moxxi’s bar. snuck away time at sir hammerlock’s lodge. kissed, in secret, in too many places and too many times to count. axton was the first person in a long time to see their face.

right after the six of them--maya, gaige, salvador, krieg, axton, them--had finished up that wild expedition to whichever continent it was sir hammerlock asked them all to come hunting with him on, maya had said she needed a break from this business, and everyone sighed in relief. they promised to keep in touch. it sort of worked, but at some point zer0 got too busy with their new jobs to really keep up correspondence with anyone. they got used to being alone again, and axton went his own way like everyone else did.

it was then that they met rhys, and athena, and all that mess. they came back to sanctuary for a little bit before lilith had needed their help, back when it still existed, but they didn’t live there anymore. everyone knew it. they’d liked rhys even back then, and they thought maybe they’d forget axton. it was real easy to never see someone again in the mercenary business.

the stars shift little by little in the sky above zer0. maybe lorelei will have something for them to do in an hour or so, once they come out of that meeting at atlas hq with rhys. the meeting that zer0 is standing watch for. zer0 isn’t the only one on guard, but they put themself up to it. zer0 won’t lose another one of their loved ones.

thinking about it leads nowhere but guilt. and it wasn’t really their fault.  _ it isn’t my fault,  _ they thought, again. rhys does his best to remind them that time heals wounds. zer0 wants to laugh at that. time heals nothing for them.

they remember it too well, really, and the first year they’d lost a lot of sleep over it. sitting here under those very same stars didn’t help.

four years ago, right after lilith had sent them out to the stars to get ready for whatever war it was she thought was coming, axton and zer0 had found themselves sitting in the cool evening air on promethea. they had been on a roof somewhere in lectra city, with a little campfire going because it had gotten cold. concrete doesn’t mind a little fire anyways. he still glowed like the two sunned dawn on zer0’s home planet. zer0 hasn’t seen those suns in decades, but no matter. 

_ hey sunset _ , he started, and they knew something was wrong.  _ i’ve been meaning to ask you something. _

_ go ahead, ask me / what is on your mind, sunrise? / is this important? _

_ well, uh, kinda. y’see, i’ve been wondering about where it was you went before lilith called us back to uh, well, sanctuary. _

zer0 went still. their faceplate flashed, briefly, a red emoticon of a grimace. they hadn’t wanted this question to come up. axton knew them well enough to know that they had recognised vaughn. zer0 didn’t really want to tell, because, well, zer0 had liked rhys from the moment they met him. and that story wasn’t one zer0 wanted to share then, not to the man they still loved. not after the way rhys had disappeared after they fought that vault. not after the way zer0 had felt when they learned he was gone.

zer0 regrets that now.  _ rhys wasn’t gone. rhys isn’t gone, and axton is, and how could i have been so foolish-- _ zero stops themself before they spiral, but the memories still trickle in.

axton had looked at them, worried. and continued on, the fool, admirable as he was.  _ i, well. i knew you knew that vaughn guy or whatever. i’m just, i’m just kinda wondering... how? _

zer0 stiffened even more at that. it was a sore subject. rhys had gone missing just two months before lilith’s call, and zer0 still missed him and the silly, naïve way that he didn’t know what he was doing until he did. reminded them of axton, really, in those two or so years when he wasn’t with them. zer0 couldn’t remember how that had happened anyhow. they weren’t sure it mattered. 

a bright red ellipsis settled on their helmet, and axton just stared at them, refusing to respond. thoughts swam through zer0’s head. had the fling with rhys been cheating, or...? what would axton think of them if they told the whole story? wouldn’t axton know if they were lying?

axton sighed and moved to go inside.  _ i’ll just be in here, y’know, whenever,  _ he called back before the door to the stairwell shut. zer0 sat still a few more minutes.

that was the mistake, of course, the waiting. they know that now, and knew it right after, but didn’t then. they wish they had. as soon as they had turned to follow, the world seemed to rock beneath their feet. an explosion, somewhere in the lower section of the apartment building they were renting out of. bandits.

_ fuck! _ they thought, as the building shook again. was it bandits? zer0 leapt down the stairs to their room, looking desperately for axton. this was only supposed to be routine scouting for people to help the cause of the crimson raiders, not a dangerous excursion into bandit camps! 

mind racing, zer0 scoured the room for axton. no luck. the next explosion tilted the whole floor to the south a bit, and zer0 realised they were going to die in the next one if they didn’t get out as fast as they could. the window was open. they took it.

the leap out of it was a big one, even for a nimble assassin. they floundered on the edge of the next building for a minute, then ran as fast as they could for the next. and the next. all the while they heard that apartment building come down, crashing in a giant cacophony of steel and concrete buckling, breaking. the dust rose high. 

zer0 ran all the way to their intended rendezvous with axton, back in meridian. on foot. saw him nowhere. not a trace of him anywhere; nothing. they waited a week, then two, then three. still nothing. they picked over the ruins of that building carefully, and wondered who’d done it. nothing at all. zer0 wonders now if it was some group of dahl still mad at axton for going awol, or just some regular bounty hunters. who would blow up a whole building to get one man? they can’t have been the intended target, because no one came after them like that in the weeks to come. and zer0 never saw axton again. like that, the dream was gone. a year and a few months in total. 

zer0 never saw a body, either. axton had just... disappeared, seemingly into thin air. but that window had been open, when zer0 knew they had left it closed. sometime after that was when zer0 had let lilith know she wasn’t their employer anymore.

at least rhys had come back. they didn’t lose everything, and if lilith’s intel is right, maya and krieg aren’t gone, either. 

a bright red dot appears on their faceplate and drips, drips, drips down the side. under the helmet, a single tear has already fallen. zer0 doesn’t want to think about it.

zer0 already thought about it, and hates it. so they go back to staring out the window, scouring the skies for maliwan drop ships and the ground for maliwan soldiers. or calypso-cult bandits, children of the vault or whatever the fuck. nothing.

zer0 shakes their head and waits, standing watch. waiting for lorelei’s sweet voice in their ear with their next mission. the night takes too long, and thoughts of axton are still gentle on their mind.

they wonder if they’ll ever have that dream again.


End file.
